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ABA Journal Web 100, Best Law Blogs (2015-17) (then discontinued)
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by John Wesley Hall
Criminal Defense Lawyer and
Search and seizure law consultant
Little Rock, Arkansas
Contact: forhall @ aol.com
Search and Seizure (6th ed. 2025)
www.johnwesleyhall.com -
© 2003-26,
online since Feb. 24, 2003 Approx. 600,000 visits (non-robot) since 2012 Approx. 50,000 posts since 2003 (29,000 on WordPress as of 12/31/25) -
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Fourth Amendment cases, citations, and links -
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To search Search and Seizure on Lexis.com $ -
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FBI Domestic Investigations and Operations Guide (2008) (pdf)
DEA Agents Manual (2002) (download)
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Stringrays (ACLU No. Cal.) (pdf)
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Congressional Research Service:
--Electronic Communications Privacy Act (2012)
--Overview of the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (2012)
--Outline of Federal Statutes Governing Wiretapping and Electronic Eavesdropping (2012)
--Federal Statutes Governing Wiretapping and Electronic Eavesdropping (2012)
--Federal Laws Relating to Cybersecurity: Discussion of Proposed Revisions (2012)
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Section 1983 Blog -
"If it was easy, everybody would be doing it. It isn't, and they don't."
—Me -
"Life is not a matter of holding good cards, but of playing a poor hand well."
–Josh Billings (pseudonym of Henry Wheeler Shaw), Josh Billings on Ice, and Other Things (1868) (erroneously attributed to Robert Louis Stevenson, among others) -
“I am still learning.”
—Domenico Giuntalodi (but misattributed to Michelangelo Buonarroti (common phrase throughout 1500's)). -
"Love work; hate mastery over others; and avoid intimacy with the government."
—Shemaya, in the Thalmud -
"It is a pleasant world we live in, sir, a very pleasant world. There are bad people in it, Mr. Richard, but if there were no bad people, there would be no good lawyers."
—Charles Dickens, “The Old Curiosity Shop ... With a Frontispiece. From a Painting by Geo. Cattermole, Etc.” 255 (1848) -
"A system of law that not only makes certain conduct criminal, but also lays down rules for the conduct of the authorities, often becomes complex in its application to individual cases, and will from time to time produce imperfect results, especially if one's attention is confined to the particular case at bar. Some criminals do go free because of the necessity of keeping government and its servants in their place. That is one of the costs of having and enforcing a Bill of Rights. This country is built on the assumption that the cost is worth paying, and that in the long run we are all both freer and safer if the Constitution is strictly enforced."
—Williams v. Nix, 700 F. 2d 1164, 1173 (8th Cir. 1983) (Richard Sheppard Arnold, J.), rev'd Nix v. Williams, 467 US. 431 (1984). -
"The criminal goes free, if he must, but it is the law that sets him free. Nothing can destroy a government more quickly than its failure to observe its own laws, or worse, its disregard of the charter of its own existence."
—Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S. 643, 659 (1961). -
"Any costs the exclusionary rule are costs imposed directly by the Fourth Amendment."
—Yale Kamisar, 86 Mich.L.Rev. 1, 36 n. 151 (1987). -
"There have been powerful hydraulic pressures throughout our history that bear heavily on the Court to water down constitutional guarantees and give the police the upper hand. That hydraulic pressure has probably never been greater than it is today."
— Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 39 (1968) (Douglas, J., dissenting). -
"The great end, for which men entered into society, was to secure their property."
—Entick v. Carrington, 19 How.St.Tr. 1029, 1066, 95 Eng. Rep. 807 (C.P. 1765) -
"It is a fair summary of history to say that the safeguards of liberty have frequently been forged in controversies involving not very nice people. And so, while we are concerned here with a shabby defrauder, we must deal with his case in the context of what are really the great themes expressed by the Fourth Amendment."
—United States v. Rabinowitz, 339 U.S. 56, 69 (1950) (Frankfurter, J., dissenting) -
"The course of true law pertaining to searches and seizures, as enunciated here, has not–to put it mildly–run smooth."
—Chapman v. United States, 365 U.S. 610, 618 (1961) (Frankfurter, J., concurring). -
"A search is a search, even if it happens to disclose nothing but the bottom of a turntable."
—Arizona v. Hicks, 480 U.S. 321, 325 (1987) -
"For the Fourth Amendment protects people, not places. What a person knowingly exposes to the public, even in his own home or office, is not a subject of Fourth Amendment protection. ... But what he seeks to preserve as private, even in an area accessible to the public, may be constitutionally protected."
—Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 351 (1967) -
“Experience should teach us to be most on guard to protect liberty when the Government’s purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil-minded
rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding.”
—United States v. Olmstead, 277 U.S. 438, 479 (1925) (Brandeis, J., dissenting)
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“Liberty—the freedom from unwarranted intrusion by government—is as easily lost through insistent nibbles by government officials who seek to do their jobs too well as by those whose purpose it is to oppress; the piranha can be as deadly as the shark.”
—United States v. $124,570, 873 F.2d 1240, 1246 (9th Cir. 1989) -
"You can't always get what you want / But if you try sometimes / You just might find / You get what you need."
—Mick Jagger & Keith Richards, Let it Bleed (album, 1969) -
"In Germany, they first came for the communists,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a communist. Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for
the Catholics and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Catholic. Then they came
for me–and by that time there was nobody left to speak up."
—Martin Niemöller (1945) [he served seven years in a concentration camp] -
“Children grow up thinking the adult world is ordered, rational, fit for purpose. It’s crap. Becoming a man is realising that it’s all rotten. Realising how to celebrate that rottenness, that’s freedom.”
– John le Carré, The Night Manager (1993), line by Richard Roper -
"The point of the Fourth Amendment, which often is not grasped by zealous officers, is not that it denies law enforcement the support of the usual inferences which reasonable men draw from evidence. Its protection consists in requiring that those inferences be drawn by a neutral and detached magistrate instead of being judged by the officer engaged in the often competitive enterprise of ferreting out crime."
—Johnson v. United States, 333 U.S. 10, 13-14 (1948) -
The book was dedicated in the first (1982) and sixth (2025) editions to Justin William Hall (1975-2025). He was three when this project started in 1978.
Website design by Wally Waller, Colorado Springs. 
Category Archives: Cell phones
CA8: Where two crimes alleged in affidavit and PC as to each is sufficient, Franks challenge to one is moot
Defendant’s Franks challenge fails: There were two unrelated crimes referred to, and the PC as to the drug crime was not challenged. As to the other, that wasn’t even in federal court, so it doesn’t matter and wasn’t material to … Continue reading
CA11: FL deferred prosecution “pretrial intervention program” subject to probation searches
Defendant was entered into “a pretrial intervention program as part of a deferred prosecution agreement with the State of Florida. Florida offers the program to first-time offenders and some second-time offenders, Fla. Stat. § 948.08(2), who are then supervised by … Continue reading
NE: Def didn’t have standing in her husband’s cell phone when they lived apart
Defendant had no standing in photographs on her husband’s cell phone. They’d lived apart for five months, had separate accounts, and his was password protected. She had no right to it or the ability to exclude others; therefore, no standing. … Continue reading
The Guardian: FBI could force us to turn on iPhone cameras and microphones, says Apple
The Guardian: FBI could force us to turn on iPhone cameras and microphones, says Apple: Eddy Cue warns precedent set by San Bernardino case could lead to company being forced to turn users’ smartphones into surveillance devices.
CA9: Probation search of cell phone for missing one probation meeting unreasonable; rule unclear “property” includes data
A probation search of defendant’s cell phone based on missing a single probation meeting was unreasonable for various reasons: The heightened privacy in a cell phone v. the ubiquity of cell phones in everyday life and the unclear provision that … Continue reading
IA: Probation pre-consent to search sex offender’s cell phone was valid
Defendant’s probation search conditions included consent to search his property, and his cell phone was properly searched. “An additional consideration supports our conclusion Barth consented to the search of his cellular phone for non-investigatory purposes. Barth was participating in the … Continue reading
N.D.Cal.: Pre-Riley warrantless state search of cell phone was valid, so GFE applies
Defendant’s cell phone was searched without a warrant pre-Riley under California’s Diaz which expressly permitted warrantless cell phone searches. Therefore, that search was valid at the time under the good faith exception. United States v. Williams, 2016 U.S. Dist. LEXIS … Continue reading
D.Ore.: Fair inference shown in affidavit that cell phone used in drug trafficking for its SW
The affidavit for the cell phone search warrant provides at least a fair probability of a connection between defendant’s cell phone and his drug activity. “Many, if not most, people who use cell phones with storage capabilities keep important information … Continue reading
AL: Objection to search of person doesn’t preserve claim of cell phone search
Defendant’s appellate argument that his cell phone was searched without a warrant wasn’t preserved at trial by the argument he objected to the search of his person. In any event, it was said during trial there was a warrant. Alonso … Continue reading
NYTimes Editorial: Why Apple Is Right to Challenge an Order to Help the F.B.I.
NYTimes Editorial: Why Apple Is Right to Challenge an Order to Help the F.B.I.: It is understandable that federal investigators want to unlock an iPhone used by one of the attackers who killed 14 people in San Bernardino, Calif., in … Continue reading
The Atlantic: The Conscription of Apple’s Software Engineers
The Atlantic: The Conscription of Apple’s Software Engineers by Conor Friedersdorf: The federal government is empowered to compel individuals and corporations to hand over data in their possession upon the presentation of a valid search warrant. Is the FBI also … Continue reading
WaPo: Preliminary thoughts on the Apple iPhone order in the San Bernardino case (Part 1)
WaPo: Preliminary thoughts on the Apple iPhone order in the San Bernardino case (Part 1) by Orin Kerr: A lot of people are talking about a court order in California requiring Apple to help the FBI disable features of the … Continue reading
C.D.Cal.: Apple ordered to crack password encryption on San Bernardino shooter’s iPhone
A USMJ in the Central District of California signed a proposed order from the government to backdoor an Apple iPhone found in the belongings of one of the San Bernardino shooters by writing software and billing the government for the … Continue reading
M.D.Ala.: Younger abstention bars § 1983 case over drug search filed while state criminal case is pending
Plaintiff from the county jail sued the drug task force that arrested him while the criminal case was pending. His claim is barred by Younger abstention. The case is dismissed except as to a damages claim which is stayed pending … Continue reading
Juris.org: Why Police May Still Have Free Reign to Search an Arrestee’s Cell Phone Despite a Warrant
Juris.org: Why Police May Still Have Free Reign to Search an Arrestee’s Cell Phone Despite a Warrant by Veronica Reyes of St. John’s University School of Law, Class of 2016:
MA: SW for cell phone not always limited like SW for premises
The search warrant for defendant’s cell phone for receiving threats did not have to be limited to text messages alone. The warrant could be quite broad. The court engages in an interesting discussion of differences between physical and digital searches. … Continue reading
E.D.Ky.: Cell phone likely had evidence on it and police saw it in plain view and could seize it to get SW
Defendant and his wife had an argument about him communicating with underage girls, and he left the house and she called the police. The phone was in plain view in the house, it had apparent evidence on it, and it … Continue reading
CA6: SW for cell phone for video of def’s obstructing officer properly led to finding CP
Defendant was stopped by a police officer and became argumentative, and he refused to provide his license, insurance, and registration. He said he was attempting to record the officer on his cell phone but he was too busy with it … Continue reading